How to Move

Kristi and I are moving to Colorado in July. We’ve taken three broad steps to make this move happen:

We both are in process with new jobs

I just started working remotely for Litmus, which means I can seamlessly transition to Colorado this summer. Kristi spent a few days last week interviewing with public schools and attending a teachers fair in Colorado.

We’re moving, and we may even be gainfully employed!

We’re shedding as many of our possessions as we can

We’re moving to Colorado and don’t want to drop $2k for a u-haul truck. We’ll be towing the smallest enclosed u-haul trailer available behind our Toyota Corolla. This means limited cargo space. We’re both excited about this, because as mentioned before, we’re moving in the direction of minimalism.

We have a sofa bed that we love, and I really love our kitchen knives and one cast-iron skillet. Everything else is replaceable, so we’re trimming down our wardrobes, getting rid of kick-knacks, ditching almost all of our physical books, and experimenting with less.

We’re putting our money where our mouth is

Moving is not cheap, but it certainly doesn’t have to be expensive. Beyond that, we’re moving to Colorado for the lifestyle benefits, so we’re putting our money in that direction as well. We have a few financial benchmarks that we’re working on. We’re almost done paying off our car, which we were unexpectedly forced into buying late last year. When we get to Colorado, we’ll be able to enjoy the opportunities it offers to the fullest.

Why Move?

Almost every time we mention we’re moving to Colorado, we hear two things:

“That is AMAZING! Colorado is great. “

“I wish I could do that.”

Well - you can. If you accept certain sacrifices, and hustle to line up your cards right, you can do it. There is the spectrum of what it takes to move across the country:

On one end of the spectrum, you could quit your job tomorrow, load up your car, and move.

This would probably leave a few loose ends, and would be better if you just committed a crime and had to hustle out of town. Maybe you should just drive to Mexico if you’re in this situation.

On the other end of the spectrum, you may never move until someone offers you a job, a place to live, a relocation bonus, pays for your things and your time, and finds you a friend-group to plug into without any work on your behalf.

This bar is pretty high, and I wouldn’t hold my breath.

So - we picked something in the middle. Kristi worked on getting a teaching job, and I worked on getting a remote job. These are both working out, and now we’re figuring out what to do with our things and our money. That’s it. We’re leaving behind friends and family, but these relationships are important enough to invest time and money in maintaining. The rest (casual friendships) can be rebuilt in our new location.